Curriculum and Assessment Review

Lord Leong Excerpts

Monday 10th November 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Baker of Dorking (Con)]

My Lords, I congratulate the Minister and the Government on accepting the major recommendation of the Becky Francis report, which was to remove the EBacc curriculum that was imposed on all schools by Michael Gove—now the noble Lord, Lord Gove—in 2010. The EBacc consists of eight academic subjects. Word for word, the same subjects were taught in our schools from 1904, and so for 14 years we have had an Edwardian curriculum. It is not surprising that disadvantaged children were not helped. When the Conservatives came into office, there were just over 300,000 disadvantaged students; when they left office 14 years later, there were more than 300,000 disadvantaged students, and that is a disgrace. The other effect of the EBacc is that, when the Conservatives were in office, youth unemployment rose to 13.6%. That is almost the highest rate in Europe and double what it is in Germany. One of the tasks of this Government must be to reduce that level of youth unemployment.

I will say one thing. I hope that the Minister will refute the comments made last week by the noble Lord, Lord Gove, who said, in effect, that by abolishing the EBacc, social expansion and social development would somehow be destroyed in schools. The reality is the exact reverse: when comprehensives will be allowed to take more cultural subjects and more subjects on climate change, data skills and AI, they will find that social responsibility expands dramatically. That is the lesson of the university technical colleges that I have been promoting for the past 14 years. We have an unemployment rate of 5%, but young people leaving school have an unemployment rate of 13.6%—that is totally and utterly unacceptable.

I will say one other thing; I must try to be briefer than some of the other speakers. I will discuss only one element—another interesting thought to give the House. In the Becky Francis report, she said that she wanted to stand for “evolution not revolution”. I am afraid that the reality is completely the reverse. The way that the Government are making changes, first in skills—the noble Baroness is the Skills Minister—V-levels and all of that, and now the Becky Francis report, and now the Bill going through—

[Lord in Waiting/Government Whip (Lord Leong) (Lab)]

My Lords—

[Lord Baker of Dorking (Con)]

I am going to sit down in a moment.

[Lord Leong (Lab)]

May the noble Lord wind up, because we have other speakers coming up as well?

[Lord Baker of Dorking (Con)]

Some of the long speeches we hear are not from the Back Benches but from the Front Benches, if I may say so. The only comment I will make is that the Government have in fact embarked on revolution, not evolution.